**The Importance of Short Films at Pixar**

One of the reasons Pixar produces short films is to give filmmakers opportunities to stay and work on projects between feature film productions. According to John Lasseter, the director of The Blue Umbrella and Monsters University's accompanying short film, "it's one of the reasons we do short films...we have projects that people can work on in between um you know the time on features." This allows Pixar employees to continue working on creative endeavors and stay engaged with the company.

**The Need for Fresh Perspectives at Pixar**

Pixar has a distinct look and feel, which is immediately apparent in their films. The need for fresh perspectives and new voices is crucial to maintaining this style. As Lasseter notes, "one of those voices is the director of The Blue Umbrella...I started in 2008 at pixer in the camera and staging Department with which basically does the virtual cinematography of the films." This emphasis on innovation and creative collaboration allows Pixar to continue pushing boundaries and producing unique stories.

**The Open Door Policy at Pixar**

Pixar has an open door policy, allowing anyone to pitch ideas for short films as long as they have three ideas. Lasseter shares his own experience of pitching a concept that he had experimented with, using test footage on his phone. He explains, "I just thought well I should as well just try it...it was based on a test I had shot just just for fun on my phone actually of of faces in the city and then I had loaded them up my computer one weekend and animated them." This approach allows Pixar to tap into fresh ideas and perspectives.

**The Supportive Environment at Pixar**

Pixar is known for its supportive environment, which encourages employees to explore different creative avenues. According to Lasseter, "it's kind of a nice playground to have people try out new roles and new positions...they're not just limited to one thing." This approach has allowed Lasseter to move through various roles within the company, including his work on Monsters Inc. and Cars.

**The Collaboration Process at Pixar**

Pixar is famous for its collaborative approach to filmmaking. According to Lasseter, "we always like everyone works together to make the features happen." He notes that even when problems arise, the team comes together to solve them. The focus remains on creative collaboration and storytelling, with a commitment to delivering high-quality films.

**The Risk of Scaling Up**

While Pixar is expanding its production schedule, Lasseter acknowledges that there are risks involved. "sometimes we throw the whole movie out and start over completely...it's really a process of not falling in love with your work." This approach ensures that the final product meets the company's standards.

**The Importance of Time for Story Development**

Despite the increased production pace, Pixar remains committed to giving itself sufficient time for story development. Lasseter notes, "we're we're creating more movies and putting more people on them but we're back we're backing up so that we still give ourselves the amount of time for story development that we need." This ensures that the company can maintain its focus on storytelling and creative innovation.

**Pixar's Future Plans**

With six films in production over the next four years, Pixar is gearing up for an exciting period of growth. According to Lasseter, "the only question is can Pixar's approach to film making hold up under the volume." However, with a talented team and a collaborative approach, he remains confident that the company will continue to thrive.

**Lasseter's Personal Experience**

As an animator since childhood, Lasseter brings a wealth of experience to his work at Pixar. He notes, "I've been animating since I was a kid drawing on cards...I was studying animation at Ry Toy Story came out my senior year they came and brought it to Ry and they were said they were looking for an intern and I was the first animation intern you worked on Monsters Inc as well you said yeah I was that was the first film I was a lead I was a directing animator which means I was kind of a deputy to the sheriff on that one and then I supervised cars up and now Monsters University." This personal experience has shaped his approach to filmmaking and collaboration at Pixar.

**The Current State of Animation**

Lasseter reflects on his own growth within the company, "I am stoked for vacation...I'm going to try some storyboarding and U just approach animation from another angle and and I don't know we'll see what what happens next." With a focus on collaboration and creative innovation, Lasseter remains excited about the future of animation at Pixar.

**The Supportive Environment**

Lasseter notes that "it's an incredibly supportive environment so so while it's a little bit scary we have the confidence that we have this amazingly talented group of people around us to help us um when we get in trouble." This support system allows employees to take risks and try new things, which is essential for innovation and creative growth.

**The Recordings**

Pixar has an impressive track record of producing high-quality films. Lasseter notes that "we have a team of animators who work on the records...they create the visual language for our films." This emphasis on quality control ensures that every film meets Pixar's standards.

**Conclusion**

For Pixar, short films are an essential part of its creative process. By giving employees opportunities to stay and work on projects, Pixar fosters a culture of innovation and collaboration. With a focus on storytelling and creative growth, the company remains committed to producing high-quality films that continue to inspire audiences around the world.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enwe're here in Emeryville California at Pixar Animation Studios you might have heard of Pixar it's the company behind Toy Story a bugs life Wall-E Finding Nemo Monsters Incorporated up and the company's latest movie Monsters University I know you're a princess and I'm just a stable boy mom what are you doing grabby paw was in my bed were you kissing my hand no and what about you with all your shedding I don't shed really I had just started at Pixar when the first movie came out so I mean I was a fan of Monsters Inc and um just the idea of telling a college story and and the idea of telling a story about a character that doesn't get exactly what they want was really appealing to to me I think with any Pixar movie that's the thing that gets us excited is the thing where we think that could come off bad or that could be like the dangerous part the part's like are we really going to try to do that cuz that could be that's where I I think we all get excited like well we don't have we don't know but I like that about whenever I hear what a new Pixar idea is I think I think oh how are they going to sell that and that's good cuz it hopefully means it's original and and and and taking a risk Rick and I both worked on the first Monsters Incorporated and if you ever go back and watch the first one again you'll notice that the same like 12 background monsters are everywhere we just like repurpose them and put things in their hands and stuff so I think you know we always said that we' really use all the parts of the Buffalo making that movie and so I think both of us really wanted to make sure that we you know populated the world more densely this time around normally the process at Pixar is we would do the background characters later as the story evolved and was kind of changing we knew that we needed to populate this campus Because we did it so early it would help influence story so story would come up with gags based upon some of these designs and then vice versa they would come up with a gag and hopefully we can cast someone from this group we need a slug for the okay let's look at all the Slugs I can't be late on the first day Pixar isn't structured like a traditional movie studio instead of bringing people together on a project by project basis as a group of talented folks in house across every single discipline I worked in the industry for 10 years before I got here so I worked a lot of different places I was down in LA and you kind of jump around a little bit more down in La here you just kind of stay I've worked at places that are out the opposite we have a term where you know oh yeah well you're basically just a wrist there and all you're doing is just drawing you're not thinking which it's really limiting you know you're really you're really um stunting the growth of the film or whatever you're working on if you're not allowing uh an environment where creative ideas can rise to the top and uh get the best product that you can get from the very beginning John worked really really hard to form a studio that wasn't hire up a crew for one film let them all go restart again and and do that every four or five years he wanted people to stay that's you know one of the reasons we do short films because we have projects that people can work on in between um you know the time on features and uh I think he just he he really really believes that it's important to keep people here and keep giving them New Opportunities and new learning experiences the Studios movies have a distinct look and feel almost immediately you can tell that you're watching a Pixar movie that makes the need for fresh creative voices with different perspectives even more important one of those voices is the director of The Blue Umbrella the short film that accompanies Monsters University I started in 2008 at pixer in the camera and staging Department with which basically does the virtual cinematography of the films there's an open door policy at pixa about pitching ideas for short films so anyone can pitch as long as you have three ideas and I just thought well I should as well just try it it was based on a test I had shot just just for fun on my phone actually of of faces in the city and then I had loaded them up my computer one weekend and animated them and that was part of the pitch I showed just to show what I mean with a city coming to life you talk to Pixar employees and this isn't a fly by night kind of place people are here for 10 years 15 years 20 years the studio does a lot to let employees explore different creative Avenues and different disciplines they may not have the chance to look at otherwise it's kind of a nice playground to have people try out new roles and new positions and even sometimes in different departments to kind of be a bit more playful with that I've been animating since I was a kid drawing on cards and um I was studying animation at Ry Toy Story came out my senior year they came and brought it to Ry and they were said they were looking for an intern and I was the first animation intern you worked on Monsters Inc as well you said yeah I was that was the first film I was a lead I was a directing animator which means I was kind of a deputy to the sheriff on that one and then I supervised cars up and now Monsters University so what's do you have a next one line up or you like stoked for vacation at this point I am stoked for vacation I I actually am in between uh I'm going to try some the storyboarding and and U just approach animation from another angle and and I don't know we'll see what what happens next it is an incredibly supportive environment so so while it's a little bit scary we have the confidence that we have this amazingly talented group of people around us to help us um when we get in trouble yeah Pixar has recorded actors in this room for every film since Monsters Incorporated and it's about to get even busier the company has six films line up over the next four years the only question is can Pixar's approach to film making hold up under the volume we've developed a collective style almost because it is so collaborative here and because the same people are working on the films for years and years we are under an umbrella but it's a very big umbrella it's exciting as new people come in uh they change that a little bit I'm writing on a couple of things but I'm also helping out on the upcoming features um in in the cam and staging department so it's a mix of tons of different things because we always like everyone works together to make the features happen um and then on the side you're doing other things as well there's a desire to say bring something new here you know what what what do you want to do it will all get filtered into a you know what I mean into a process that feels somewhat familiar but that's all the more reason why you need a variety of people that's all the more reason why you need a new outlook we'll find out over the next couple of years how Pixar's aggressive new Pace will work out but inside the studio walls the focus is the same as it's always been on cre cretive collaboration and story story story sometimes we throw the whole movie out and start over completely it's really a process of not falling in love with your work if there is a problem with the film we're all going to get together and fix it and we're not going to let go until we know we fix it and if that means pushing a release date or if that means delaying things on other shows we'll do it and the most important thing is we're not really scaling up or changing the amount of time for the story which is the one thing I think we need the time for I mean we're we're creating more movies and putting more people on them but we're back we're backing up so that we still give ourselves the amount of time for story development that we need rightwe're here in Emeryville California at Pixar Animation Studios you might have heard of Pixar it's the company behind Toy Story a bugs life Wall-E Finding Nemo Monsters Incorporated up and the company's latest movie Monsters University I know you're a princess and I'm just a stable boy mom what are you doing grabby paw was in my bed were you kissing my hand no and what about you with all your shedding I don't shed really I had just started at Pixar when the first movie came out so I mean I was a fan of Monsters Inc and um just the idea of telling a college story and and the idea of telling a story about a character that doesn't get exactly what they want was really appealing to to me I think with any Pixar movie that's the thing that gets us excited is the thing where we think that could come off bad or that could be like the dangerous part the part's like are we really going to try to do that cuz that could be that's where I I think we all get excited like well we don't have we don't know but I like that about whenever I hear what a new Pixar idea is I think I think oh how are they going to sell that and that's good cuz it hopefully means it's original and and and and taking a risk Rick and I both worked on the first Monsters Incorporated and if you ever go back and watch the first one again you'll notice that the same like 12 background monsters are everywhere we just like repurpose them and put things in their hands and stuff so I think you know we always said that we' really use all the parts of the Buffalo making that movie and so I think both of us really wanted to make sure that we you know populated the world more densely this time around normally the process at Pixar is we would do the background characters later as the story evolved and was kind of changing we knew that we needed to populate this campus Because we did it so early it would help influence story so story would come up with gags based upon some of these designs and then vice versa they would come up with a gag and hopefully we can cast someone from this group we need a slug for the okay let's look at all the Slugs I can't be late on the first day Pixar isn't structured like a traditional movie studio instead of bringing people together on a project by project basis as a group of talented folks in house across every single discipline I worked in the industry for 10 years before I got here so I worked a lot of different places I was down in LA and you kind of jump around a little bit more down in La here you just kind of stay I've worked at places that are out the opposite we have a term where you know oh yeah well you're basically just a wrist there and all you're doing is just drawing you're not thinking which it's really limiting you know you're really you're really um stunting the growth of the film or whatever you're working on if you're not allowing uh an environment where creative ideas can rise to the top and uh get the best product that you can get from the very beginning John worked really really hard to form a studio that wasn't hire up a crew for one film let them all go restart again and and do that every four or five years he wanted people to stay that's you know one of the reasons we do short films because we have projects that people can work on in between um you know the time on features and uh I think he just he he really really believes that it's important to keep people here and keep giving them New Opportunities and new learning experiences the Studios movies have a distinct look and feel almost immediately you can tell that you're watching a Pixar movie that makes the need for fresh creative voices with different perspectives even more important one of those voices is the director of The Blue Umbrella the short film that accompanies Monsters University I started in 2008 at pixer in the camera and staging Department with which basically does the virtual cinematography of the films there's an open door policy at pixa about pitching ideas for short films so anyone can pitch as long as you have three ideas and I just thought well I should as well just try it it was based on a test I had shot just just for fun on my phone actually of of faces in the city and then I had loaded them up my computer one weekend and animated them and that was part of the pitch I showed just to show what I mean with a city coming to life you talk to Pixar employees and this isn't a fly by night kind of place people are here for 10 years 15 years 20 years the studio does a lot to let employees explore different creative Avenues and different disciplines they may not have the chance to look at otherwise it's kind of a nice playground to have people try out new roles and new positions and even sometimes in different departments to kind of be a bit more playful with that I've been animating since I was a kid drawing on cards and um I was studying animation at Ry Toy Story came out my senior year they came and brought it to Ry and they were said they were looking for an intern and I was the first animation intern you worked on Monsters Inc as well you said yeah I was that was the first film I was a lead I was a directing animator which means I was kind of a deputy to the sheriff on that one and then I supervised cars up and now Monsters University so what's do you have a next one line up or you like stoked for vacation at this point I am stoked for vacation I I actually am in between uh I'm going to try some the storyboarding and and U just approach animation from another angle and and I don't know we'll see what what happens next it is an incredibly supportive environment so so while it's a little bit scary we have the confidence that we have this amazingly talented group of people around us to help us um when we get in trouble yeah Pixar has recorded actors in this room for every film since Monsters Incorporated and it's about to get even busier the company has six films line up over the next four years the only question is can Pixar's approach to film making hold up under the volume we've developed a collective style almost because it is so collaborative here and because the same people are working on the films for years and years we are under an umbrella but it's a very big umbrella it's exciting as new people come in uh they change that a little bit I'm writing on a couple of things but I'm also helping out on the upcoming features um in in the cam and staging department so it's a mix of tons of different things because we always like everyone works together to make the features happen um and then on the side you're doing other things as well there's a desire to say bring something new here you know what what what do you want to do it will all get filtered into a you know what I mean into a process that feels somewhat familiar but that's all the more reason why you need a variety of people that's all the more reason why you need a new outlook we'll find out over the next couple of years how Pixar's aggressive new Pace will work out but inside the studio walls the focus is the same as it's always been on cre cretive collaboration and story story story sometimes we throw the whole movie out and start over completely it's really a process of not falling in love with your work if there is a problem with the film we're all going to get together and fix it and we're not going to let go until we know we fix it and if that means pushing a release date or if that means delaying things on other shows we'll do it and the most important thing is we're not really scaling up or changing the amount of time for the story which is the one thing I think we need the time for I mean we're we're creating more movies and putting more people on them but we're back we're backing up so that we still give ourselves the amount of time for story development that we need right\n"